IRVINE, Scotland — Lottie Woad had 4 birdies in a six-hole stretch across the flip and posted a 5-under 67 on Saturday to keep up her two-shot lead within the Women’s Scottish Open as she closes in on victory in her skilled debut.
Woad has such management of her recreation at Dundonald Hyperlinks that she went 33 consecutive holes and not using a bogey till dropping a shot on the fifteenth.
Her lead was down to at least one shot, however the 21-year-old from England responded with a brief wedge she performed completely on the seventeenth, leaving her an 8-foot birdie putt she transformed. A closing par put her at 17-under 199.
Nanna Koerstz Madsen of Denmark, who caught Woad early with an eagle on the par-5 third gap, fell behind after Woad’s birdie streak. However the Dane rallied with three straight birdies and a few par saves for a 67.
She was two pictures behind, together with Sei Young Kim (66), who made an extended eagle putt on the 14th and obtained up-and-down for birdie on the par-5 closing gap to get inside two pictures.
Nelly Korda performed bogey-free, however the American managed solely two birdies on one other comparatively calm day by Scottish requirements. Her 70 left her 5 pictures behind Woad, who already has had a golden summer season in Europe.
Woad, who gained the Augusta Nationwide Ladies’s Beginner in 2024 and rose to No. 1 within the ladies’s novice rating that yr, gained the Irish Ladies’s Open three weeks in the past on the Girls European Tour.
Then she missed the playoff by one shot within the Evian Championship. However her tie for third within the LPGA main earned her a tour card, and she or he determined to skip her senior yr at Florida State and switch professional. Now she has an opportunity to win in her debut.
“That is the intention, to shoot as little as attainable and maintain giving myself probabilities,” Woad mentioned. “If somebody shoots lights out, truthful sufficient. I am excited for the chance. I’ve obtained the expertise, and I will attempt to use that.”
Kim has 12 titles on the LPGA Tour, together with the Ladies’s PGA Championship in 2020 at Aronimink, although she is arising on 5 years since her final win. She shall be in remaining group Sunday with Woad and Madsen.
Korda, in the meantime, has a whole lot of floor to make up if she desires to finish her shocking drought. She gained seven instances final season on the LPGA however has but to win this yr.
“Wasn’t hitting it in all probability nearly as good as I used to be the primary two days,” Korda mentioned. “I made some actually good par saves and simply did not actually capitalize on a few of my good pictures. However that is golf. That is OK. I nonetheless have tomorrow.”
Woad will attempt to match Rose Zhang by profitable on the LPGA Tour in her professional debut. Zhang did that at Liberty Nationwide two years in the past within the Mizuho Americas Open.
The Ladies’s Scottish Open is co-sanctioned by the LPGA and the LET.
